


A Treatise on the Admirable Ezra Kelly

by zeekubeast



Category: Shaderunners (Webcomic)
Genre: Easton's mental navel-gazing is exactly as pretentious as you'd think it would be, Internal Monologue, M/M, T for the implication that they've been banging but not M because it's very vague
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-21
Updated: 2018-09-21
Packaged: 2019-07-15 02:40:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,809
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16053722
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zeekubeast/pseuds/zeekubeast
Summary: One can’t help but admire Ezra Kelly.That’s what Easton thinks to himself, waking up with the grime of last night thick in his mouth, only to see Ezra’s sleep-mussed hair spilled on his bare chest.It’s just a question ofwhatone admires about Ezra Kelly.





	A Treatise on the Admirable Ezra Kelly

**Author's Note:**

> You ever read a webcomic twice in a week and become obsessed with a vaguely defined romantic relationship? That sure happened here.  
> Thank you to ZawehZaweh for beta-ing this spontaneous gush of emotions.

One can’t help but admire Ezra Kelly.

That’s what Easton thinks to himself, waking up with the grime of last night thick in his mouth, only to see Ezra’s sleep-mussed hair spilled on his bare chest. Easton blinks and scrapes his tongue across his teeth. He lets himself soak in the sight of Ezra, asleep with his head resting over his heart and his face slack. Easton lets his head fall back into the threadbare pillow to stare at the ceiling.

It’s just a question of _what_ one admires about Ezra Kelly.

\---

Ivo admires his style. It’s hard not to have some of it, when you’ve got money. Kelly dresses well. His suits are tailored to hug his frame like a fond acquaintance, and there’s never been a darned hole or mended tear to be seen on them.

“And he’s pretty enough,” Ivo said with a pin between her teeth. She was pinning lace with rhinestone to a skirt when the subject came up. “Pretty enough for some, at least.”

Easton has seen him get dressed for a night of wining and dining among the low-gilts and high-inks. Kelly is fastidious in his grooming. His cuffs and collars always crisp, his waistcoats snug around his chest, his shoes shined like glass. Dressing up for Lady This or Majess That.

... or Lord Hareton Peacourt, heir to a world that Easton can only dream of.

Easton has watched, unlit smoke hanging from his lips, leaning against the wall in his sweat-stained vest, his work-worn hands in his soot-stained pockets. He sometimes made snide remarks about fabric or cut, but mostly he just watched something pretty turn beautiful from a distance. Ezra Kelly glitters like every silver pocket watch and diamond ring that Easton’s stared at through a wall of glass.

It feels like theft when Easton gets to discard his clothes like patterned wrapping paper, when he gets to hold Ezra with his own hands. A pretty thing, not meant for the gutter-born likes of him, but his, for now. His to hold, to kiss, to wear around his neck and on his fingers like the star-plucked diamonds he stares at hungrily. It’s a thrill to take what the world thinks is beyond his reach.

But Ezra has never been beyond his.

\---

Satinder admires his charisma. She might have been lit like a bonfire the night she proclaimed Ezra Kelly as the King of the Colour-Thieves, but there’s a little hint of truth to it.

Kelly is charismatic... _sometimes_. He can talk to gilts and pull gossip like the best of them. His education gets his foot in more doors than not, especially when it comes to finding out their next lead. When Kelly speaks to the group, whether it’s outlining the set-up for their next hit or just waxing historical about something or other, they listen.

 It’s hard not to listen to that smooth voice, syllables clean and sparkling as a newly minted coin. And when Kelly speaks to you directly—well…

It’s hard not to listen.

Easton rarely gets to see the charismatic side of Ezra Kelly, but he’s only got himself to blame for that. It’s fun to fluster the man, pull the rug out from under his scholarly mind and watch him struggle to keep his footing in a conversation.

But when Easton gives him half a chance to be charming, Ezra doesn’t waste it. The warm smile that reaches his eyes, the warm words and the _attention_...

There’s a reason Easton doesn’t give Ezra much of a chance to be charming around him.

\---

Dom, the lark he picked up on a whim and hasn’t been able to shake since, admires his generosity. The dewy-eyed Tourmish boy thanked Kelly for the copper-op tickets for a week straight. When Kelly buys the food and drinks or brings trinkets to share among the group, Domigo Valdes looks at him like he might have set the sun in the sky, just for them.

Kelly has been giving out gifts for almost as long as Easton has known him. The little pile of books kept on the top floor of the Dial keeps growing, to the point where when Easton’s half-way through the original collection, the stack has almost doubled. Kelly acts like he meant there to be that much all along, and apologizes like a man slow to pay his rent.

It’s a little irritating, to be honest. Like the gifts that mean so much to Easton Lynch, the boy that never got more schooling than what would make him useful to move crates, are just a matter of fact. He reads the books every day, regardless.

Ezra Kelly is generous in other ways too. When they’re alone and have time, Ezra gives himself to Easton, over and over. His pianist’s fingers pull him close and hold him like a precious thing. His pale lips, chapped with worry, kiss every callous and bruise on his working-man’s body. He pulls Easton’s hand down to fist in his hair while he kneels between his thighs. He pushes himself into Easton’s hands, opens for him at the slightest nudge. He gives pleasure and praise like Easton set the sun in the sky, just for him.

It’s far too easy for Easton to get drunk on the taste of Ezra against him. He doesn’t feel guilty about it though. He only takes what’s freely given.

\---

Pamina admires his compassion, his bleeding heart that weighs like an anchor around the group’s heels. She says it keeps them from losing sight of _why_ they do this in the first place. Every fret and hiss of worry that spills from Kelly’s mouth makes Easton feel faintly sick. Every mistake, every slip-up, every didn’t-think-it-through and must-have-slipped-my-mind seems to land on the man’s shoulders and crush those damned sighs straight out of his chest.

Easton can’t decide whether he thinks it’s arrogant of Kelly to take credit for all the world, or whether it’s pitiable that Kelly can’t seem to stop carving pieces of himself off to pay some imagined debt.

“You’d slit your throat to save someone dying of thirst, Kelly,” he’d said in one of their arguments.

Ezra burned at the accusation. But couldn’t deny it.

Easton pulled him down from his throne at the piano to sit on the floor with him. “Even for someone like me?” He’d asked, lips to the pulse of his neck, broad hands fisted in his shirt.

Ezra had looked at him with such sad eyes. Those pale fingers reaching for him instead of pushing him away. Every time.

“I’d do it for _you_ ,” he replied, completely earnest as he pushed the hair out of Easton’s eyes to touch the scar that had been his fault so many years ago. “You damned idiot.”

“A real martyr, you are,” Easton had laughed and crushed the man close to his chest so he could feel him sigh into his mouth. He’d whispered, “Pour some of your heart out for me too, Professor.”

_You know that I need it._

And Easton feels dizzy and sick when Ezra pours his heart out over the world, because deep down, he wants it all for himself. He wants to pull Ezra to lie in the gutter with him, to hold his hand while they stare at the unreachable stars. He wants to be treasured by this man who could get anything he wanted from the world, to be seen as something more than just an orphan boy grown into working man in a cruel city. He wants to kiss Ezra Kelly, stain his pretty white skin with soot and bruises and every ugly thing that is Easton Lynch, so that he’ll be his for true.

But that’s showing too much of his own hurts to fit whatever they are, so all he does is tease him over it.

\---

When it comes down to it, Easton admires his anger. Ezra Kelly doesn’t suffer fools, nor does he suffer injustice. Behind the big words, behind the suffocating worry and overflowing guilt, Ezra Kelly is furious at the world. He sees the problems, the hungry faces of the crowds, the mountains of wealth behind high walls, and he is outraged by the unfairness of it all.

Why else would a man like Ezra Kelly ever think to steal back the colour of the world?

Easton loves courting that fire that makes Ezra the light that all of the Shaderunners follow. He taunts and leers and lures it out of hiding, just so that he can see Kelly burn up. It’s a little funny, sure, but mostly Easton just wants to know it’s still there. That Ezra has that same yearning, burning scar inside of him too. That he won’t let the world get away with it without reaching for it first.

Easton loves to see Ezra get burned up at him, loves the way the fury bleeds into their kisses when they’ve been clashing. Even if it’s all flash-pan and Ezra can’t help but fade to a simmer under Easton’s hands and mouth, that spark of outrage is enough to warm Easton’s care-worn heart.

They disagree on many things: on how to run a heist, on how to share the colour, on whether it’s right or wrong or somewhere in between to even dare to pull this scheme in the first place. But they don’t disagree that they both want it. They don’t disagree that they both want each other.

Whatever it is that that means for them. They haven’t really talked about it yet. Easton doubts that they’ll talk about it any time soon. It doesn’t really matter right now, anyway.

\---

Ezra stirring against his chest draws Easton’s eyes away from the ceiling. He's barely awake when Easton cups his face and draws him into a kiss. Ezra kisses back, his fingertips digging into Easton’s shoulders.

Ezra blinks drowsily when they break apart.

 “... Your breath tastes awful,” he mutters, still half-asleep.

“Didn’t seem to bother you that much,” Easton replies. He runs his fingers through the man’s messy hair, making it messier. It’s only a matter of time before Ezra will be groomed and gone again.

“Mm,” Ezra leans into the touch like a cat and Easton admires him.

He admires the planes of his shoulders, the sprawl of gangly arms over Easton’s chest, the way the first rays of morning light catch his sleepy eyes and make them shine. He admires the way Ezra pulls himself closer under the blanket, his bare skin slightly cool against Easton’s from the fading night air. Easton admires this pretty, charming, compassionate, righteous man in his bed and in his arms.

With a hand under his jaw and an arm around his waist, Easton guides Ezra back up to kiss him.

And he decides to keep his admiration to himself.

For now.


End file.
